Join the incredible Rennie Grove nursing team which helps to mend families’ heartbreak

Iain Rennie support nurse Jenny Roberts, right, with a carer

It’s always an emotional and heartbreaking time for families when they lose a loved one to a terminal illness, but a charity plays a key role in making that critical time easier to bear.

Now the Rennie Grove team – based on Tring’s Icknield Way industrial estate – is seeking five new registered nurses to work shifts between 30 and 37.5 hours a week, including evenings and weekends. So what do the roles involve?

Support nurses Lynn Grout and Jenny Roberts are part of a 24-hour responsive nursing service – thought to be the only one of its kind in England – that assesses and administers care to up to 90 patients suffering from terminal illnesses such as cancer at any one time.

Their duties range from washing patients, administering medication and setting up syringe drivers to providing pre- and post-bereavement care to families.

The care provided by the nursing team enables 65 per cent of patients to pass away in their own home – compared with just 25 per cent nationally, and the charity is a well-oiled machine.

Nurses work closely with other healthcare staff including GPs, district nurses and hospital consultants – as well as other hospices and charities – to ensure each patient receives personal, co-ordinated care in a place of their choice, be it at home or in a hospice.

Lynn, who lives in Tring and is mother to two boys, said: “People often have a misconception about palliative care. We often have some patients refuse our care because they believe they’re dying. But it’s not unusual to discharge people, and that’s the best part of the job.”

Jenny said: “We feel privileged to be part of people’s end of life. You often hear midwives saying that about a birth – it’s the same for us, but at the other end.”